


Like Flowers

by DameRuth



Series: Flowers [2]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alien Biology, F/M, Kinda-sorta OT3?, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:13:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24666685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DameRuth/pseuds/DameRuth
Summary: Prompt: Jack as the Doctor's sexual surrogate with Rose.[Continuing the Teaspoon imports, originally posted 2007.11.09.]
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Rose Tyler, Ninth Doctor/Jack Harkness/Rose Tyler
Series: Flowers [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/14017
Comments: 1
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This first chapter gets a rating of PG-13 for frank discussions of sex -- rating to go up next chapter.  
>    
>  FWIW, this is the sort of thing you'll get when you hand a biologist a prompt like the one above. Many thanks to aibhinn for beta reading and clipping commas!
> 
> WARNING -- this is *not* the Bliss!verse, the Findersverse, or, honestly, my usual line of storytelling. That said, I do hope folks will enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing.

It was as ordinary a day as there ever was on the TARDIS, and Jack was happily parked on his back under the timeship’s control console, running through a series of wiring checks. Everything looked good, so he scooted out and stood to stretch his arms for a moment before moving on to the next section.  
  
“Second facet looks good,” he told the jeans-clad legs sticking out from under the first facet. He and the Doctor had split the maintenance between odds and evens today.  
  
There was a blue flash of light, a snap, and a muffled curse, followed by the Doctor sliding himself out from under the console.  
  
“First facet’s good _now_ ,” he said dryly. “I think the TARDIS likes that pretty face of yours — she doesn’t shock you near as often as me.”  
  
“Yeah, well, I’m a natural with the ladies. And the gents, come to think of it,” Jack told him with a friendly wink.  
  
The flirting was automatic, and Jack’s mind was, in actuality, focused on remembering the wiring layout under the fourth facet. He moved to walk around the Doctor and continue the job.  
  
“Jack.”  
  
The Doctor’s voice brought him up short. The tone was serious, and something about it made Jack’s stomach tighten. In his experience, conversations starting with that tone of voice were not usually good.  
  
“Yeah?” he responded, keeping his voice easy, and turning to rest his backside against the edge of one facet. He crossed his arms over his chest and raised an inquiring eyebrow.  
  
“I’ve been thinking . . .” the Doctor trailed off uncharacteristically, and if Jack didn’t know better, he’d have thought the man was at a loss for words. A little embarrassed even.  
  
“That’s good, beats the alternative,” Jack responded, his flippancy as much a reflex as his flirting.  
  
That earned him a glower, but not an unfriendly one. Then the Doctor’s frown relaxed, and he was in that odd tentative-serious mode again.  
  
“You and Rose, you’re getting on well,” the Doctor said next, and Jack’s stomach knotted again.  
  
“In a friendly way,” Jack told him, a little more forcefully than he intended.  
  
God, he hadn’t so much as laid a finger on Rose, outside of a quick, friendly hug now and then. Well, except for a boost to the backside to get her over that wall a few weeks ago but they’d been running for their lives, and not even Jack had been thinking of sex.  
  
He’d done nothing to merit getting tossed off the ship — which was where he feared this conversation was headed. He’d even thought they’d all been getting along exceptionally well . . .  
  
“I’m not making accusations, Captain,” the Doctor told him, with a hint of his usual prickliness. “I’m pointing out some facts. So shush.”  
  
Jack shushed, his fear beginning to be replaced by confusion. Where _was_ this going?  
  
The Doctor drew in a deep breath. “Rose likes you. More than a bit, and you like her.” He frowned again. “You can stop looking like a deer in the headlights. What I’m leading up to is, if the two of you wanted to be . . . closer, I wouldn’t object. In fact, I’m thinking it’d be a good thing for the two of you.”  
  
Jack blinked. It felt like someone had set a nuke off behind his eyes, he was so shocked. “Waitaminute. You’re saying you’re okay if Rose and I have sex?”  
  
“More or less, yeah.”  
  
“Sorry if I’m being dense here, but what happened to ‘hands off the blonde?’ You were pretty clear about that, the first night. Not to mention the offer to show me an airlock up close if I stepped out of line . . .”  
  
The Doctor had the grace to look genuinely embarrassed. “Didn’t know you then, did I? We’d just had a bad experience with a pretty-boy . . .” Adam. Jack had heard all about _him_ from both his traveling companions. “ . . . and I didn’t want to take chances. Now, though . . .” He shrugged. “If I didn’t trust you, you wouldn’t be working on my ship.”  
  
That, Jack understood. Back when, nobody had touched his ship but him. But there were still a lot of things he _didn’t_ understand.  
  
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m flattered, but what about you and Rose?”  
  
“This isn’t about me and her.”  
  
“Oooooh, there you’re wrong,” Jack told him, dryly. “You two are so in love I don’t think a black hole could pull you apart. What’s with tossing _me_ in Rose’s direction? Why not do the job yourself?”  
  
The Doctor rested a hip against the edge of the control panel and crossed his arms, mirroring Jack’s pose. He looked less embarrassed now, and more argumentative, which made Jack feel they were on more familiar ground.  
  
“Because Rose and I aren’t physically compatible,” he told Jack, plain and simple.  
  
“There’s compatible and compatible. Trust me, I know.”  
  
“ _Really_ not compatible,” the Doctor insisted, firmly.  
  
Jack cocked his head and narrowed his eyes. The Doctor was nine hundred years old, and no innocent besides. He hardly seemed the type to be naïve about mechanics, but . . . “What I can see of you is perfectly compatible. You’ve got hands, a mouth, a tongue. You can go quite a ways with that.”  
  
“Maybe not as far as you think — it’s not just parts, it’s chemistry. The pheromones aren’t there, on either side. I couldn’t respond to her, or her to me, that way. I could touch her, but I couldn’t give her what she needs.”  
  
“And I could.”  
  
“You’re human. You’re her friend. And I trust you,” the Doctor told him, his blue eyes unwavering and sincere.  
  
Jack blew out his breath and looked down at his shoes, rubbing his neck speculatively. “I can’t tell you I’m not attracted to her,” he said, returning honesty for honesty, “but I’m gonna have to think about this.” He shot the Doctor a wry glance. “A one-night stand or a little fling with a stranger is one thing — but even in my day, a person thinks twice about taking up with a crewmate. When it’s someone you live with, work with, every day . . . that makes a difference. I’ve been flirting, but I haven’t meant it since that first week.”  
  
“Yeah, kind of had that figured,” the Doctor told him, not unkindly. “Still, seen how you two look at each other. I may be incompatible, but I’m not blind.”  
  
Jack snorted, but couldn’t make any denials without lying. They were silent, but it wasn’t an unfriendly silence.  
  
“Not to mention,” Jack pointed out after a moment, “there’s Rose to consider. She was damn near as up-front as you were, that first week.”  
  
The Doctor blinked, and looked taken aback. “She was?”  
  
“Yep. Didn’t threaten to chuck me out an airlock, but she’s got her own methods of persuasion.” Jack couldn’t help grinning at the Doctor’s utterly shocked expression. “If it was ‘hands off the blonde’ from you, it was ‘hands off the Time Lord’ from her. That's why I spent so much time with my hands in my _pockets_ for a while. I wanted to live.”  
  
The Doctor appeared to be processing the new information with difficulty, and Jack had to laugh.  
  
“I’m guessing you haven’t talked to Rose yet?”  
  
“Erm. No.”  
  
“Well, when you do, for God’s sake, have a care how you go about it. If you just walk up to her and say, ‘Oi, I’ve decided it’s okay for you to have a go at shagging the Captain,’ we’ll be picking your teeth out of the deck grating for weeks.” Jack chuckled and shook his head.  
  
He took a deep breath, and let his stomach relax, finally. It was still an . . . interesting situation, but the relief was tremendous.  
  
“In the meantime, are we gonna finish this checkup?”  
  
“Hm. Yeah. Be sure to check over the stabilizer relays. I think they’re due for some replacements . . .”  
  
“Yessir,” Jack told him, and moved to comply.  
  
\--  
  
Rose hugged a pillow to her stomach, where she sat cross-legged on her bed, and thought. The Doctor was lying on his back, feet on the floor and his hands behind his head, next to her. It was a common enough thing for them to be sprawled out on furniture together that both of them were entirely at their ease.  
  
“’Not compatible.’ What’s that mean, exactly?” she asked, in her best analytical voice. If she could keep this on the level of abstracts, she could keep from being embarrassed, so she clung to that frame of mind as best as possible.  
  
“Means what it says. Like trying to plug a USB cord into a wall socket,” the Doctor said, easily.  
  
“But . . .” Rose eyed him where he lay. All of the fine details of him, down to the musculature of his wrists, the dark lashes of his eyes, the texture of his skin . . . “you don’t look any different.”  
  
“That’s just what you can see,” the Doctor qualified. “It’s convergent evolution — the humanoid body form is one of the best and most efficient there is. Natural selection ends up picking it out again and again. Arms, legs, head, all the everyday things, they look the same, because that’s what works.  
  
“Sex organs, though, that’s different. They aren’t under any selection except for makin’ sure the egg and sperm get together. So you get all _kinds_ of different shapes, and they don’t change much over time. S’ long as they work _during sex_ , that’s all that matters.  
  
“It's like plants — roots and stems and leaves, they all change to match the environment, because they have such basic jobs to do. Photosynthesis. Growth. Pullling water out of the ground. There are only so many ways to do that, so you only see so many shapes out there.  
  
“But flowers’re just for sex. They don’t have to care about the environment, so they change less often than the rest. That’s why botanists use flower structure to classify plants — s’ what shows the true relationships between different species.”  
  
Anyone else, and Rose would be dying of shame right now, talking about this (even through the medium of flowers), especially since they were on _her bed_ , but since it was the Doctor, somehow it was easy.  
  
“So, if that’s the way it is, what was with all the ‘sure I dance’ stuff, then?” she asked.  
  
He was quiet for a moment. “Didn’t trust him, and I thought he might be like Adam. Didn’t want you getting too attached to him, so I tried distracting you. Probably not the best idea, but I was in a hurry . . .”  
  
“You tend to do things at a dead run,” Rose told him affectionately.  
  
"And I _do_ dance."  
  
"Yeah, you do at that."  
  
She fell silent and thought things over, with no worry that the Doctor might find the quiet uncomfortable. He knew her better than that.  
  
“Have you talked to Jack yet?” she asked, finally.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
She grinned. “Did you tell him you weren’t gonna chuck him out an airlock after all?”  
  
The Doctor’s eyes snapped open, and looked at her upside down. “He told you about that?”  
  
“Yeah,” she said. “Did he tell you what I said to him?”  
  
“Not in detail,” the Doctor said, obviously curious.  
  
“Well, then, guess it’s our secret,” she said, smugly.  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Can't think of anything terribly relevant to say, here, so I'll let the chapter stand on its own. More thanks to aibhinn for betaing and commenting!

It was about a week later when the Doctor, wandering the hallways late in the TARDIS’s “night,” turned a corner and found Rose and Jack kissing each other in the corridor outside her bedroom.  
  
What he saw of it was passionate, but the minute they heard him they pulled apart. The wide, almost guilty eyes they turned in his direction told him this was probably their first foray into the new boundaries of their relationship.  
  
Mostly he was glad, but a single, foolish part of him twinged with loneliness. Still, nothing to be done — he was the last of his kind, and if it hurt to be reminded about it, well, he needed to get used to it.  
  
“Don’t mind me,” he told them, with a close-lipped smile. “I’ll just be on my way . . .” He shouldered past, intending to carry on to the control room, where he’d been heading in the first place.  
  
“Doctor?”  
  
Rose’s voice stopped him dead in his tracks.  
  
He turned to find her — both of them, actually — gazing at him with flushed faces and dilated eyes.  
  
She swallowed. “You don’t have to go,” she said. The mixture of arousal and affection in her face was unmistakable.  
  
He sighed, and his hearts warmed in spite of himself. “Not compatible, Rose,” he reminded her. “I’ll just . . .”  
  
She swallowed again, and flushed further — not from arousal this time, he sensed, or not only so. “I mean . . .” she ducked her head for a moment, then looked back up at him, her face open and pleading, “I don’t want you to go. I want you to stay. Compatible or not.”  
  
The Doctor sensed it had taken a lot for her to admit that, and he walked back to the two humans. He rested a hand on Rose’s shoulder, massaging the muscles. His glance flickered to Jack, who raised a neutral eyebrow.  
  
_This is between the two of you,_ that eyebrow said, without words. _I’m fine either way — your choice,_  
  
The Doctor looked down into Rose’s dark brown eyes, and knew he would do whatever she asked. “If it’s what you want,” he told her.  
  
She stared up at him, and he saw the fine tremor running through her. “Yeah, it’s what I want. I know it’s kinda . . . “ she trailed off, but he could guess at the words running through her mind. _Kinky,_ almost certainly. _Wrong,_ too, probably.  
  
To reassure her, he smiled, and kissed her overheated forehead. “It’s what you want,” he told her, firmly and affectionately, and that was that.  
  
The look in her eyes was so grateful he hoped she wouldn’t end up being disappointed.  
  
“Everything’s fair in love and war,” Jack commented with good cheer. “And when it comes to sex, _all_ bets are off.”  
  
\--  
  
They both insisted on kissing him and he didn’t refuse, since it was a gesture of which he was perfectly capable, but very quickly the two humans began concentrating on each other once they were in Rose’s bedroom. Not a surprise, since they were both shedding pheromones into the air by the gallon, and were exchanging increasingly intensive hormonal signals everywhere their skin touched.  
  
For such a chemically noisy species, the Doctor reflected, humans were amazingly blind to their own signals -- at least on a conscious level.  
  
Since it was something he could assist with, the Doctor helped Rose and Jack remove each other’s clothing, adding affectionate touches here and there, but letting them do most of the work, since they had the instincts for it.  
  
It was only when she and Jack were completely naked and perched on the edge of the bed that Rose roused her awareness enough to frown at the Doctor. “You’re still dressed,” she told him, sounding put out.  
  
“Not much point in me getting naked,” he said, cheerfully.  
  
Rose pulled free from Jack and stalked towards the Doctor, every gesture guaranteed to send a human male over the edge.  
  
“I dunno,” she purred. “Maybe you’ll be more compatible than you think.”  
  
He sighed. “Well, if you insist.” Probably best to get it all out in the open, as it were, for once and for all.  
  
Working quickly and efficiently, he stripped off coat and jumper. Rose eyed his bare torso appreciatively, running her tongue over her teeth, reaching out to run warm fingertips along the muscles of his chest. Jack had flopped over on his side on the bed, and was watching, propped on one elbow, with great interest.  
  
The Doctor bent over and unlaced his boots with practiced speed, while Rose stroked his back. The touch was pleasant, in the manner of friendly physical contact, but no more.  
  
When he straightened, he met Rose’s eyes, shining with anticipation, and gave her a faint smile. Without hesitation, he unbuckled his belt, unzipped the fly of his jeans, and hooked his thumbs under the waistband of both jeans and underpants so he could strip the two layers off in one, smooth movement. Kicking the discarded boots and clothing to the side, he straightened again, and waited with hands on hips for the inevitable reaction.  
  
Rose’s eyes traveled eagerly down his torso . . . and then stopped dead when her gaze met his crotch.  
  
She blinked, and all the seduction went out of her expression as her eyes widened in surprise.  
  
“Oh,” she said, in a rather small voice. “That’s . . . complex.”  
  
Jack rolled off the bed and padded over so he could see around Rose, who was blocking his view.  
  
When he got a clear line of sight, his eyebrows shot up. “Different,” was his comment.  
  
“I wouldn’t even know where to start,” Rose said, cocking her head to one side and frowning.  
  
“I wouldn’t either,” Jack agreed. “And that’s saying something.” He met the Doctor’s gaze and shook his head ruefully. “When you say ‘incompatible,” you mean it,” he said.  
  
“I usually do,” the Doctor shot back.  
  
Rose, to her credit, was looking daunted but in no way disgusted. She looked up at the Doctor’s face, and when he smiled, she smiled back. “Well, I know _this_ works,” she said and reached up to pull him in close for a kiss.  
  
He responded affectionately, pulling her close so their bodies pressed together. The hot, silky-soft skin of her belly rubbed against his cool genitalia, and her nipples brushed his chest, but while the sensation was mildly pleasant, it was in no way sensual. There was no spark to it, nothing to engender either arousal or desire. She smelled of musk and rain and herself, and it was delightful, but only because it was her scent, and he loved her.  
  
When the kiss ended, Rose stared up into his eyes, her expression searching. Considering. She licked her lips, tasting the Doctor’s saliva — which no doubt was as neutral as water to her.  
  
“I . . . think I see what you mean, “ she said a little sadly. She reached up and ran her hand along the Doctor’s close-cropped hair. He leaned into her touch, eyelids drooping, like a cat being stroked. She let her hand trace the curve of his skull, down and around to his jawline. “It’s not working, is it?”  
  
He reached up to cover her hand with his own, pressing it more closely to his cool skin. He smiled at her. “No, it’s not,” he told her, his voice gentle.  
  
Jack stepped closer behind Rose and reached out to stroke her hair, his hand continuing down along her neck, and resting on her shoulder.  
  
Her response was immediate. She arched into his touch, and her eyes, still locked with the Doctor’s, dilated hugely in a second. She looked like someone about to be pulled into a whirlpool, but resisting desperately.  
  
Jack rubbed his cheek against Rose’s hair, with gentle affection.  
  
“Rose,” he said, his voice filled with subtle undertones that her brainstem would hear, even if she didn’t recognize them consciously, “come to bed.”  
  
With an expression approaching anguish, she turned from the Doctor to Jack, who took her gently into his arms and kissed her with deep, unhurried passion. She responded in kind, with open enthusiasm . . . but when Jack broke the kiss and moved to draw her away, her hand reached back and caught the Doctor’s.  
  
Unresisting, he let her pull him along.  
  
\--  
  
Following a little maneuvering, they ended up with Rose in the middle, facing Jack.  
  
While Rose and Jack got down to serious business, the Doctor ran his hands affectionately along Rose’s back and shoulders, since she made it clear she wanted contact with him, too. He took it as a compliment, since he certainly wasn’t able to match the sorts of things the Captain was doing to her.  
  
With the initial foreplay accomplished (involving much kissing, caressing and tonguing) Jack’s hand slipped down Rose’s sweat-slick belly, and from there to between her legs. After less than ten seconds of direct stimulation, Rose suddenly arched and stiffened. When she relaxed again, gasping for air, she ducked her head and buried her face in Jack’s shoulder for a moment.  
  
“Sorry,” she mumbled, obviously embarrassed. “That was a little fast . . .”  
  
Chuckling, but gently, rather than mockingly, Jack tilted her chin so he could brush a kiss against her lips. “Don’t _apologize_!’ he told her. “If you’re set on that kind of hair trigger it just means you’ve been really needing this.”  
  
“Yeah, I guess I have,” Rose said, with a grateful smile. “Been a long time. Over a year.”  
  
“A year?” the Doctor interrupted without thinking, “Really?”  
  
Rose rolled her eyes, and lightly bumped an elbow back against him.. “ _Time_ Lord. Yes, a year. Didn’t have much of a chance, did I? Adam didn’t get anywhere — not that he wouldn’t have liked to.” Her voice went smug for a moment, before resuming in a more normal tone, “And Mickey was a total loss this last time out.”  
  
The Doctor made a noncommittal noise in his throat. “I was tryin’ to give you chances . . .”  
  
“You did,” Rose, said, rolling her head a little awkwardly to look at him. “I just didn’t end up taking them.” The tiny half-curve of her smile spoke volumes as to why she hadn’t. “Guess I’m just not as practical as you, Jack,” she added turning back to her human partner and running her fingertips along his shoulder and neck, culminating with a kiss on his throat.  
  
“Mmm,” Jack rumbled. “Maybe not as practical as you think. I went out, but the last few times, what I found didn’t seem all that attractive for some reason . . .”  
  
That segued smoothly into a mutual kiss, and the two of them were off again — Rose just as active as Jack, the Doctor was pleased to see.  
  
Eventually, he had to shift a little when things progressed and Rose needed to roll onto her back. The two of them seemed inclined, this first time out, to stick to the basics.  
  
Human anatomy was really remarkably simple; that, along with the incredible force of their chemical emissions, was what allowed humanity to find “dance” partners across so many species. When you got down to it, humans could match up with nearly anything.  
  
Nearly.  
  
Even humans recognized how basic a system it was — “tab A into slot B,” as the humorous saying went. Not necessarily the most beautiful or graceful means available for exchanging genetic material, true. The Lelt’lellen probably had that honor, what with their modulated light pulses, or the R!tshc#h with their thousand-tendrilled embrace . . . but the Doctor had to admit the human version looked much friendlier and more entertaining for those involved.  
Rose and Jack were moving in a tight, steady rhythm, completely absorbed in each other. Rose’s skin was flushed, and her eyes were closed, lips parted. She was beautiful, the Doctor thought, as he lay propped on his side, watching the tiny shifts in her expression.  
  
Suddenly, her eyes snapped open, and met his. The brown of her irises was almost completely eclipsed by her dilated pupils, and from her rather desperate expression she was controlling herself, holding back. Wordlessly, she held out her hand. Her breath was coming deep and even, as if she were running.  
  
Understanding, the Doctor took her hand, threading his fingers through hers.  
  
She managed a half-smile, squeezing his hand gratefully, and then her eyes closed, and her grip tightened involuntarily as she found her second release of the evening.  
  
Jack saw her through with exceptional care, stopping at the end to drop a kiss onto her forehead, even though his own breathing was deep and ragged.  
  
Rose made a small noise deep in her throat and began to move again. With a huff of breath, Jack responded powerfully, driving himself the short additional distance to his own completion. Rose made another soft sound of satisfaction and gently drew him down to rest on her body, the fingers of her free hand caressing him between the shoulder blades while the hand that still held the Doctor’s eased its hold. Her grip was sweat-slick and forge-hot against the Doctor’s cool, dry skin.  
  
With small touches, kisses, and nuzzles, the two humans relaxed together, tense muscles uncoiling. Jack gave Rose one last, lingering kiss and then rolled off to lie on her far side. He draped one arm across her waist — and, not coincidentally, his hand came to rest on the Doctor’s hip. With a tug and wiggle, Jack pulled the three of them close together.  
  
Rose practically purred, and shifted her head slightly so her wide, luminous eyes could focus on the Doctor. She looked utterly happy and he smiled back, glad for her. It was not lost on him that she’d wanted to share the closest thing possible to direct coupling, with all the accompanying implications. No need to fear the pretty boys; whatever she might feel for them, she loved him, and that wouldn’t change.  
  
With a last caress along Jack’s neck and shoulder, Rose shifted so she could wrap her arm across the Doctor’s body, cradling her head on his chest, curling up like a kitten. Jack adjusted to follow her body’s contours, his arm still covering her and the Doctor together.  
  
They lay together for a while in comfortable silence. Slowly, Rose’s breathing evened out, and she fell asleep. She seemed very small and fragile once her powerful personality wasn’t in play, and her unquestioning trust soothed the Doctor in ways he couldn’t have begun to articulate.  
  
He rubbed his cheek against her hair, and caught sight of Jack, watching him. Jack’s expression was relaxed and gentle. Pleased. It was rather how the Doctor fancied he’d looked, watching Rose and Jack together. Then Jack’s brows drew together slightly, and he shifted (carefully, so as not to wake Rose), so he could lever himself up and over. The Doctor realized what was coming, and accepted Jack’s kiss amiably.  
  
After a moment, Jack pulled back, and his frown was deeper as he gazed into the Doctor’s eyes, searching for something. He didn’t seem to find it, and lowered himself back to the mattress on Rose’s far side. Then he broke into a crooked grin and shook his head ruefully.  
  
“Not a thing,” he murmured, in response to the Doctor’s raised eyebrows. “That’s . . . weird. I didn’t really notice before, but then I was kissing Rose, too.”  
  
“So I’m finally seeing the great Jack Harkness stumped?” the Doctor asked, a smug smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.  
  
“I guess so. It _would_ be you.” Jack’s tone was affectionate. His brows drew together in a faint frown again, and his expression turned considering.  
  
“Still, as the saying goes, where there’s a will, there’s usually a way . . .” he said.  
  
The Doctor shot a dubious look back at him. Although, he thought, it would be a mistake to underestimate the quick intelligence behind those bright blue eyes. Jack might not always think things through properly and he often reacted with his gut rather than his head, but he was very, very bright.  
  
All the same, even with bypass respiration at his disposal, the Doctor didn’t think he’d be holding his breath on the matter.  
  
A moment more, and Jack’s gaze unfocused slightly, preceding an impressively cavernous yawn.  
  
“Well,” he conceded, snuggling down against Rose. “That’s a question for another day.” His eyes closed, and he settled in to sleep — but just before he dropped off, he cracked open an eye and fixed the Doctor with one last gaze.  
  
“Don’t think you’re getting off the hook that easily, though,” he cautioned. Then he was gone, his sleeping features oddly innocent.  
  



	3. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some things simply can't be easily explained . . .

Rose pushed though the door of the little fish'n'chips shop, scanning the assembled patrons. It only took a second to spot Shireen, who waved when she saw Rose.  
  
Rose, Jack, and the Doctor made their way to the booth Shireen had staked out for them, and Rose made the necessary introductions.  
  
"This is the Doctor," she said, and he obediently extended his hand with a slightly insincere smile. He wasn't thrilled with this little detour -- but Shireen had happened to call Jackie's flat when Rose was there doing laundry, and she couldn't exactly turn down the offer of a meeting to catch up with one of her best and oldest friends.  
  
Shireen took his hand, and her eyebrows went up. Rose wasn't sure if it was from the difference in body temperature, or if it was a more generally questioning gesture.  
  
"Doctor of what?" Shireen asked him. "Medical or University?"  
  
"Both," he told her, in a pleasant-but-final voice.  
  
Rose hurried to fill the gap. "And this is Captain Jack Harkness."  
  
Shireen appraised Jack with frank appreciation, and all but fluttered her lashes as she took his hand. "So you're Rose's boyfriend . . .?" she asked in a leading tone of voice, sounding rather as if she hoped the answer would be in the negative.  
  
Rose saw Jack blink, followed by the flicker of a thought crossing his mind. His eyes lit with wicked glee, and he clearly suppressed the urge to laugh. The combination gave him a slightly demented air, but his voice was no more than mildly cheerful.  
  
"Nah -- I'm more like the Doctor's personal assistant," he told Shireen with a perfect dose of subtle irony. Rose managed to convert a spasm of laughter into a coughing fit. Next to her, she could feel as much as see the Doctor rolling his eyes heavenwards.  
  
Shireen's eyes flickered between the three of them, and she wore the small smile of someone who knows an inside joke has just been made, but cannot for the life of them figure it out. However, to Rose's immense relief, she didn't press the matter.  
  
"Right," the Doctor said, taking charge, as usual. "We haven't got long," a blatant lie if there ever was one, given that he owned a time machine, "and I'm starving. Let's order, shall we?" He dropped onto the booth seat and began perusing the brief, rather ragged menu.  
  
All the way to the restaurant, Rose had been racking her brains about what she'd say to Shireen, especially if her friend wanted to hear about Rose's travels. Rose had come up with a heavily-edited version of their recent trip to Venice that would probably work, the main thing being to avoid mentioning the _year_ they'd been there.  
  
Telling the truth wasn't really an option. Shireen was a good friend, but Rose understood her well enough to know that the whole "space and time" thing would _not_ go over well. She'd briefed Jack and the Doctor, and they'd promised to behave.  
  
Fortunately, Rose found she needn't have worried; the initial conversation centered around ordering, distributing, and consuming their food, interspersed with snippets of random, immediate small talk about the weather and the day's news. After that, a few leading questions made it easy to keep Shireen on the subject of local happenings.  
  
Jack and the Doctor, tiring quickly of gossip about the lives, births, deaths, divorces, marriages, and jobs of people they didn't know excused themselves to the counter with their coffee, leaving the women to their conversation.  
  
Eventually, though, Shireen ran out of news, and gave Rose a considering look. Rose braced herself for the inevitable.  
  
"So, your turn," she said. "What's the deal?"  
  
"'Bout what?" Rose asked.  
  
"You know -- them," Shireen told her, firmly, with a jerk of her head in the direction of Jack and the Doctor. "What do you _really_ do for this 'Doctor' bloke?"  
  
Rose shrugged. "Like I said, I'm his traveling companion."  
  
"Yeah, but what does that mean, if it's not about sex? Or _is_ it?"  
  
Rose groaned. "I've told you, the Doctor isn't like that. It's just . . . he travels so much, it gets lonely for him. He likes having company along."  
  
Shireen shook her cup to get at the ice in the bottom, and crunched on a cube, frowning. "What does he do?"  
  
_That_ was a question Rose had expected, and could answer easily. "He's a consultant. Works with a lot of charitable causes." She shrugged, and went for some of her own ice. "He likes having people around he can bounce ideas off of."  
  
"That's another thing, what was with that 'personal assistant' bit? Are they queer or something?" Shireen shot a dubious glance at the men in question. They were seated next to each other at the counter, talking a mile a minute about something, with a lot of laughing and body English.  
  
Based on Jack's gestures and what she knew of his personality, it looked to Rose like they were discussing either sex or something mechanical. She thought the latter was slightly more probable.  
  
"No, they're not queer," Rose said, rolling her eyes. True enough: the Doctor didn't have anything to do with sexual orientation as humans understood it, and in Jack's case, "queer" didn't even begin to cover it. "I told you, the Doctor isn't like that. It's _not_ about sex."  
  
Shireen made a shushing gesture and Rose saw Jack and the Doctor approaching.  
  
"If you two are gonna be a while longer," the Doctor said when they reached the table, "there's a second-hand store around the corner I'd like to show Jack. That all right?"  
  
"Yeah, fine," Rose told him with a smile. He rested a hand on her shoulder, briefly.  
  
"We won't be long. Don't wander off." His tone was stern, but warm, and his hand on her shoulder was intimate and possessive. From the corner of her eye, Rose could see Shireen's smirk. Clearly, Shireen wasn't buying Rose's denials about her relationship with the Doctor.  
  
"Have fun," Jack added, and leaned down unexpectedly to plant a full-out kiss on Rose's lips. Being Jack, he had her responding in a heartbeat.  
  
Then he broke away, gave Rose a grin and Shireen a wink, and together he and the Doctor took off to indulge their shared fondness for rummaging through leftover bits and parts.  
  
Rose turned to find Shireen gaping at her with the most perfect "Guh!" look she'd ever seen. Jack could have that effect, even when he was kissing someone else.  
  
"Well, okay," Rose said, struggling to keep a straight face. " _That_ was about sex." Then she burst into helpless laughter.  



End file.
